A related art recording head records an image on a recording medium. The recording medium is conveyed to a position opposing a nozzle formation surface having a plurality of ink discharging nozzles formed thereon, and ink is discharged from the nozzles onto the recording medium. A related art inkjet recording apparatus includes such recording head and a wiper blade that contacts the nozzle formation surface of the recording head and wipes ink attached to the nozzle formation surface.
In such recording head and inkjet recording apparatus, Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application No. 2003-1834 describes a technique to wipe ink W attached to a nozzle surface 6a or a wiper member 86 and hold the wiped ink W in a groove 18 extending along a width direction (main scan direction) of the nozzle surface 6a. The ink W wiped by the wiper member 86 can thereby prevented from dripping into the apparatus.
However, the related art inkjet recording apparatus has some disadvantages. For example, since the groove 18 that holds the ink W is configured to extend along the width direction (main scan direction) of the nozzle surface 6a, the inkjet head 6 that has the nozzle surface 6a increases in width.